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Our view: Layoffs at Beach were avoidable

The mess at the St. Augustine Beach over the downsizing of its Police Department is a case study in how not to handle a problem.

Here’s why.

Members of the Police Department were not happy with the way former Chief Richard Hedges was running things.

So, rather than go quietly and diplomatically through the chain of command, they went public with a voluminous document itemizing things that they thought the chief had done wrong.

Turns out there wasn’t much to their complaints.

The chief, who has since retired, has been exonerated of most of the criticisms, including all of the serious charges.

It is clear, though, that the chief had a problem managing the department because had he been more on top of things, he would have been aware of the problems and addressed them before they blew up in his face.

The disgruntled officers, by taking their complaints on the road, opened the door to critics who took the officers’ complaints as an opportunity to cut the size of the department and save money.

The size of the reorganized department is yet to be decided, but it is clear that it will be smaller, and that some officers will lose their jobs.

This is a lesson in the law on unintended consequences. Had the officers been wiser in the way they approached the problem as they saw it, the situation would have been resolved the way it should have been: all sides working together to solve a shared problem.

It didn’t work that way, and now some officers will be out of work soon. They have only themselves to blame.